


Buying Time

by star_ship



Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Anal Sex, Angst, Canon LGBTQ Male Character, Comfort Sex, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Friends With Benefits, Friendship, Hit It and Quit It, Loneliness, M/M, Male Slash, One Night Stands, One Shot, Sex in a TARDIS, Timey-Wimey
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-04-25
Updated: 2013-04-25
Packaged: 2017-12-09 10:42:25
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/773274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/star_ship/pseuds/star_ship
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Martha has bowed out, leaving the Doctor to his own devices. Never comfortable with being alone, he finds Jack for a quick drink.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Buying Time

It should have been impossible to crack into the main server, Torchwood held tomes of digitized information that if stolen could be used to wreak unimaginable havoc. It took the Doctor all of five bored minutes over a lukewarm cup of tea to break in and leave a single message.

Jack--

Drinks. You, me. Crying Duck. 0409092200

Don't be late.

\--Dr

Jack's heart had jumped into his throat, throwing him into a stupid panic, checking the time and date even though a moment before he hadn't needed reminding. Something must have been wrong. The rest of the world might have forgotten the atrocities of the last year that wasn't, but they were still fresh on his mind, waking him up in shaking sweats and keeping him forever on his guard. The tingle of anxiety stayed with him tightly until the meeting time, finding the Crying Duck--just a small, quiet pub off the beaten path, just outside of the city--and hoping against hope that the buzzing fear in his joints was not well kept.

The place was almost empty, but it still took Jack a moment to find him. Hunched over at the back of that bar, dressed out of the usual. No suit. No sneakers. His hair looked tamed--still styled, but not unruly--and he hadn't shaved in a while. For a second, as he crossed the bar, looking over the t-shirt and jeans, the tuxedo jacket that was too big for his wiry frame, the black boots, Jack had the image of the Doctor shaving and something about it made him want to laugh. The Doctor doing human things at all seemed funny, strange. And yet there he sat sipping gin and tonic looking like a normal single-hearted bloke. The fear receded and a strange cold of sadness replaced it as he slipped off his jacket and hung it on the bar stool beside the Time Lord.

"Doctor," he addressed fondly, smarmy grin on like always. He didn't want to let on that he could see it, the years, the hurt, the loneliness. He felt relief this didn't seem like a rendezvous for debriefing of some new horror, but part of him wished it was when the Doctor looked up and for a moment, he could see the hopelessness in his eyes before he smiled and put it away.

"Jack!" The Doctor got to his feet and put out his hand and tugged Jack into a back-slapping hug. "You got my message, then, good. All's well for you, yeah?"

Jack pulled back and looked up into the Doctor's face, wanting to call him on his bluff, to shake out the tension in his shoulders and cut to the chase, but he only nodded, sliding into his seat and ordering a scotch. "Sure, yeah. As good as it can be after... well... you know."

The Doctor pursed his lips and sighed through his nose, taking his seat again. "Yeah..." He raised the glass to his lips and drank until the ice rattled against his teeth, placing it down and sliding it across the bar, asking for another.

"So how are you? I'd say it hasn't been that long, but... well, how long has it been for you?" Jack shifted towards the other, watching his body language, testing the waters on how much he was willing to talk about. "And what's with the new look? I like it, it's becoming. Not used to you out of the old uniform."

The Doctor smiled, his nose wrinkling up. "Incognito. Just... something different." He took his fresh drink and finished half of it, letting a pregnant pause hang in the air, nearly to term. "A year or so. I needed... I needed some time."

Jack leaned back, lips parted to speak, but there was nothing to say. A year. A year alone, he could see that, he knew that. A form a penance, probably. He had felt so guilt to lose the Master, and why not? They had been the only ones of their kind left, they had known one another in their own time. If the Doctor was anything, he was faithful, believing always in the good of people. He had hoped so badly he could save the Master, from himself most of all, but like everything in his long life--

"They always leave me."

A silence fell and in it hummed a sorrow Jack had only ever seen glimpses of. And here it was bared, now. No silly suit, no wild hair, no catch phrases or bad jokes or rapid-fire technobabble. Just a man, a very rare man, with a very rare sadness.

Reaching out slowly, Jack laid a hand over the Doctor's arm. "Why did you call me here, Doctor?" The other didn't pull away and Jack squeezed a little, feeling a tiny tremor begin.

The Doctor looked up, a pleading in his eyes. "Because I'm bloody lonely." He lifted his hand and placed it over's Jack's, cold from the glass. "You're the last one left, you know. I don't want to whisk you away, I know you wont go. But I needed a friend, just for one night. A distraction."

Jack felt a smile tugging at the corner of his mouth and he knew better, but levity couldn't have been a bad thing in such a vulnerable moment, something to make the Doctor feel less raw. "A distraction, huh? What, drinking? Singing songs, telling war stories? Or...?" He flashed his best grin and felt a pang of victory when the Doctor laughed, shaking his head.

"Or, maybe. Yeah."

He hadn't been expecting that. Not even a little. He held the Doctor's gaze, trying to sort out if he was joking, but he seemed dead serious. Well, that was a pretty good distraction, after all... the best kind, perhaps. Jack let it sink in a bit before laughing, squeezing the Doctor's arm again and signalling over the bar tender. "A round more? Let's drink to a good friendship, you and me--two double shots of your best vodka--and then," he leaned in, his hand dropping down to the Doctor's thigh, "we can head back to your place." He winked, sitting back and finishing his scotch. "Where is the old girl, anyway? Didn't see her coming in."

"Oh, she's just out back." The old cadence and spark was back and Jack didn't miss how he was starting to squirm. He didn't think this had been the Doctor's intention when he'd left the message on the Torchwood server. Then, he'd probably been desperate for a friend, to see someone he knew that was still alive, that still wanted to see him, too. Jack wondered if one more drink would turn into ten and they'd never get around to the good bits, but when the Doctor finished his second drink just as the shots were being brought to them, his hand slipped down into Jack's lap, briefly but well-aimed, unmistakably purposeful, and he knew this would be their night cap to something much better.

Jack shifted closer, taking up the glass, already feeling the scotch loosening him up. He wondered if the Doctor was a light weight, how much of this he was feeling. He supposed he would find out. "To good friends, and long lives."

The Doctor smiled, raising his glass and toasting it gently against Jack's. "Cheers." The Doctor stifled down a cough, but kept his composure, waving off Jack as he reached for his wallet. He reached into his jacket and pulled out a wad of bills, holding them under the bar. "How much is enough?" he hissed, never good with money. Jack snickered a pulled a large bill out from the crumpled mess, leaving it on the bar before standing, draping his coat over his arm and gesturing towards the door.

"After you." The Doctor muttered 'cheeky' under his breath, but slid out of his chair, leading the way out of pub and around the block to the alley behind, knowing full well that Jack was watching his backside like it was prey. 

"You could be a little less obvious," he teased, pulling out the key as they reached the TARDIS, her lights glowing faintly.

"I could," Jack quipped back, stepping in behind the other as the door swung open to the large console room. He shut the door behind him and tugged the back of the Doctor's coat, pulling him into a loose embrace, "but then again, you could have worn something less flattering."

The Doctor laughed, a little uncomfortable, but he wasn't pulling away. Instead, he turned and put his hands on Jack's biceps, stepping backwards up the ramp. "Oh, come on, Jack, sex drive like yours, I'd have to wear a cardboard box for you to only look once."

Jack was halfway through a laugh and retorting, 'now who's the cheeky one?' when the Doctor's slim hands gripped the front of his shirt and pulled him into a kiss. A firm, wet, incredible kiss that had Jack's knees knocking. He caught up quickly, wrapping one arm around the Doctor's slender waist, the other going up to tangle his fingers in the other's hair. Never one to take the slow path, either of them, Jack had the Doctor pressed up against a railing in under a minute, sucking at his mouth and pressing up against his body at every point that would fit together. The Doctor's hands worked the buttons of Jack's shirt open, one long leg kicked up over his hip. "I have to tell you, this is my favorite regeneration," Jack huffed out between their hungry mouths. "Much better kisser."

The Doctor broke away, chuckling breathlessly. "You've only seen the two."

"That you know of." Jack raised a brow, smiling wider at the shocked expression tugging the Doctor's brows up. Before he could ask questions or start thinking--don't ever let the man think, not when there's so much doing to be done--Jack dove back in, spearing his tongue into the Time Lord's mouth,working him out of the jacket and one hand up under the t-shirt, wringing a moan out of him. It sounded strange, mechanical, and then he realized, the TARDIS had groaned with him.

Jack pulled back, perplexed. The Doctor continued frantically getting Jack out of his shirt, shaking his head. "She's connected to me, it's nothing."

Jack tugged at a nipple and smirked when a little wheeze issued from the main console. "Are you saying I'm getting the TARDIS off, too?" The Doctor rolled his eyes, an insufferable expression, yanking Jack back against him, kissing down his neck. Jack didn't ask anything further, tipping his head back and giving into it. The banter was part of it for him, but there was an eagerness in the Doctor's hands that he wasn't about to deny. His fingers danced across the Doctor's back, feeling the knobby ridges of his spine. "Are we going to do it here, or should we find somewhere a little more comfortable?"

He flinched when the Doctor bit his collar bone, but it made his cock twitch. The man was good, very good, and Jack had had quite a sampling to compare him to. He should have expected it, he guessed, such a long life surely had its room for idle pleasure, but he hadn't thought it would be this fiery. The other pulled away, flushed and breathless, looking around the console deck and then pushing Jack back. "No, not here. Come come, let's find a room."

Jack followed quickly behind, through an entrance into a long corridor. The Doctor snatched a map on a coiled telephone cord from an alcove in the wall, folding it open. It looked as mad as a child's drawing to Jack, but the Doctor poured over it knowingly, mumbling to himself before, "Aha! Perfect." He let the map go and it sprang back lazily into a disorderly mess in the alcove. The Doctor was off again, making a right, and Jack had to jog lightly to keep up. They made a dozen turns, the Doctor getting away from him with a short run and a sharp left and Jack was beginning to think he was getting cold feet, that he was being shaken off, when he rounded the corner and found the Doctor leaning casually against a door, hand on the knob. "And here we are, monsieur, at the French boudoir."

There were doors and control panels crowded together along the hall, suggesting small dorms beyond, but just as the TARDIS herself was bigger on the inside, the trick kept playing. The door swung open and beyond was a large chamber with high ceilings and ornate crown molding, a fire place, simulated windows to a starlit garden, and in the center of it, an enormous, silk and velvet draped bed, complete with high posts and linen curtains, all in rich shades of violet.

Jack couldn't help but laugh, doubling over when the Doctor closed the door and clapped his hands, a dozen candle flames sizzling into life on the bedside tables. "Oh, Doctor," he sighed, straightening up. "I will never doubt you to do everything in style."

"Well of course! Long life like this, I don't get nearly enough shagging in. Might as well do it grandly." He punctuated the statement with a sharp smack to Jack's ass, walking past him and leaping onto the bed, splaying himself out on his back. Leaning up on his elbows, he shot Jack the most sultry bedroom eyes Jack could remember seeing in ages and he didn't need any further prompting to climb up onto the bed and over the Doctor's long body, tugging the shirt off at last.

He sealed his mouth down against the Doctor's neck and they rolled and fought and kissed until they were both naked and achingly hard. Jack pulled the Doctor close, grinding their hips together, feeling both hearts pounding just beneath the other's ribs. He pulled from the kiss and nuzzled his nose against the Doctor's cheek, craning his neck to kiss at his eyelids. "Doctor, I have to ask... have you... have you ever been with a man?"

The look the other gave him said all he needed to know, a flat stare of mild frustration and impatience, a wordless 'of course'. Jack kissed him again, chuckling softly. "Fair enough. I was curious. And uh... how would you like to do this?"

Without a word, the Doctor pulled Jack closer and rolled onto his back, spreading his legs under the other. Jack's cock twitched and a shudder ran through him, rocking his hips against the Doctor's again. "Understood. Lu--?"

The Doctor reached under a pillow before he could finish his question and handed him a condom and a small bottle of lubricant. Jack's grin widened as he shook his head, taking both, setting the condom aside and popping open the lube as he sat back on his heels. "You are full of surprises, you know that?"

"It's sort of my thing, isn't it?" The Doctor's voice was thick with lust, rough around the edges, and Jack realized he was aching to be inside him, to have this experience with him, even knowing it would likely only be for tonight. He pushed the Doctor's long legs apart and leaned down, kissing his stomach, shimmying down and brushing his lips across the side of his shaft as he slicked his fingers and started to stroke around his hole. Part of him was a little disappointed to find the only obvious anatomical difference was the second heart, but at least he knew what to do with this. This he was very, very good at.

By the time he'd comfortably worked in three fingers, the Doctor was writhing under him wildly, gasping and groaning and bucking up into his mouth. Jack didn't want to ever forget those sounds, the most marvelous man he'd ever known falling to pieces in pleasure under his lips and hands. The sounds from him alone had Jack on the verge of madness, impatient. Sitting up, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand, he tore the condom open and rolled it over himself, scooting closer on his knees between the Doctor's parted thighs, leaning forward and kissing him passionately, purring when the Doctor's hands speared into his hair and the long legs wrapped around his waist. "Are you ready?" he asked, pulling back just enough to see the Doctor's face, to find his eyes. The other stared up at him for a long moment, rocking his hips and feeling the slick blunt head at his pucker, licking his lips and giving a single nod.

Not needing his arm twisted, Jack pressed down against him and carefully slid inside, swallowing the gasp from the Doctor's lips and settling once he was sunk completely in the other. It felt like heaven, Jack would never grow tired of sex, and this more than any others, perhaps, was a special kind of paradise. He kissed the Doctor's face, his jaw, down to suckle at his earlobe, working there and making small circles with his hips until the other began to beg in a soft voice for more.

Jack slid back slowly, pulling out nearly to the tip before pushing back in, repeating oh so slowly at first, watching the Doctor's tipped-back head, his long neck, his fluttering lids over closed eyes as he sighed out in pleasure, and ever so slowly, Jack worked faster. The Doctor's hands gripped at his shoulders, the long legs locked at the small of his back as he took up a moderate pace, long and deep strokes keeping the Doctor in that blissed out state, beautiful and, as promised, distracted. Jack gave one quick deep thrust and the other cried out, a groaning around them like being in a submarine sounding out with him. "Ooooh, molto bene..."

Jack tried a quick thrust again with an even better reaction, picking up the pace, pressing close and letting the Doctor tug him into a rough tongue-and-teeth kiss, transfixed with him as he buried himself over and over into the other. A showman, Jack was used to pulling out tricks in bed, paying close attention to a lover's needs and tailoring himself around them. Rarely did he lose himself so deeply in another, the passion between them setting his pace as he took the Doctor in his arms and squeezed, both of them looking to leave bruises with the force they were holding on with. The ship around them creaked and groaned, huffs of air from unseen vents sending ripples down Jack's back, the firelight wavering. The Doctor's hand went rogue, flying up behind him to the wall, petting it lovingly as he tugged Jack deeper inside him, legs clamped around his waist.

Jack laughed softly, watching him acknowledge his beloved blue box. At least he would always have her. If he ever worried about the Doctor when they were apart, he could rest easy knowing the TARDIS would always steer him in the right direction, his oldest and most faithful friend. But she couldn't touch him like this, she couldn't taste the sweat at the hollow of his throat or stroke his cock or hold him tight and kiss him and whisper in his ear. She could fly him across the universe and let him run for as long as his legs would hold him up, but she couldn't replace touch, passion, lust, creature comforts... the Doctor needed this, Jack could feel it in the strained tendons around his shoulders, in the furrow of his brow, he needed this so badly and how often did he get it?

Pausing buried deep inside, rolling his hips, Jack pressed his face to the Doctor's ear, petting down his arms. "If anyone in the entire universe deserves to be loved, deserves a moment of comfort like this, it's you."

The sob that rattled through the man beneath him put a knot in Jack's throat and he had to stop for a moment, hold him, kiss him tenderly, before the knot worked its way loose and they went back to the distractions again.

It felt like they were crashing as they climbed their peaks, the room shaking and humming. Jack wondered if the little blue box was rocking about in the alley or if anyone outside would be none the wiser, but when the Doctor clamped down around him and dug his fingernails into his back, he didn't care, pushing himself to his limits to work the other over, lost in his kiss and his body and his embrace.

The Doctor found his end first, crying out in Jack's ear, clutching onto him tightly, a hot sticky mess spilling out between him. Jack covered his mouth in a searing kiss, pressing on a few moments more to his own climax, seeing stars behind his eyelids, his body going hot and tense and then limp and warm and everything was good.

A long stretch passed with only the engine ticks and bated breath filling the room, quiet and soft. Jack pulled out carefully and laid himself down against the Doctor's side, the other rolling with him, not willing to separate just yet, still wrapped around him and kissing him lazily. Jack pushed his hands through his hair, smiling at him when he finally broke the kiss, his fingers trailing down to trace the edge of the Doctor's jaw. "Welcome to Club Harkness."

The tender moment broke cleanly as the Doctor began to laugh, batting Jack lightly. "Cheeky little snot, you are." He settled with a sigh against Jack's shoulder, sated and safe for at least that moment. "Thank you..."

"It's been my pleasure, really."

"Oh, I'm sure it has." Jack felt the other smile against his throat and silence fell again, hands sliding over sweaty skin in a lingering need for touch. At last, the Doctor sat up, pushing a hand back through his hair, looking wrecked, but glad to be that way.

"Am I staying the night?" Jack asked, pushing up on his elbow and swirling a fingertip over the top of the Time Lord's thigh.

The Doctor grinned, leaning to peck his lips. "Why not? Let me just turn some things off, put the old girl into sleep mode." He climbed over Jack and out of bed, giving in when Jack tugged him back for another long kiss.

When he had gone, Jack laid back against the bed, pulling the condom off carefully and putting it into a bin beside the bed. He put his arms behind his head, staring at the high ceiling, afterglow tinging his world rose and gold. He was patient for a while, not starting when he heard the ship around him begin to sound, but when the familiar whooshing started, he sat bolt upright. "Doctor?" The room began to recede around him, flickering in and out. "Doctor!"

Darkness settled and he felt a pang of panic, squinting to make the room come back into focus. Small lights slowly bled into view and the whooshing faded away. He looked around him at his own room, his clothes at the foot of the bed. He rolled and saw even the condom had made it back, in the bin beside the night stand. Anger flared up briefly but he put it to bed, flopping back against his own pillows, smiling softly

"Oh Doctor... my lonely Doctor." Jack rolled and hugged a pillow tightly, tugging the covers up around him. "I'll see you again."


End file.
